Random Look Comparing Old Anschutz Well With An OXY USA Well

Link here. 

19642, 42, OXY USA, Darlene Dvorak 1-27-34H-143-95, Murphy Creek, a Bakken well, Dunn County; t12/11; cum 50K 5/13;

For What It's Worth: Bill Gross/PIMCO -- Unemployment Prediction

This was posted almost exactly one year ago.

Just a matter of time.

Federal Reserve policies are progressively having less impact, and by this time next year (July, 2013) we'll see unemployment higher than today's 8.2 percent, Pimco co-founder Bill Gross told CNBC's "Street Signs" on Wednesday.

While the Fed could cut interest rates on reserves or adopt quantitative easing - whereby the Fed buys financial assets to inject a more money into the economy - among other policies, Gross said "interest rates are close to rock bottom at the front end of the curve and there's little the Fed can do there."

Yup.

Federal Government Approves New Natural Gas Pipeline -- So Much For That "Climate Change" Speech

Yahoo!News is reporting:

The federal government has given the green light to a proposal to build 234 miles of pipeline to transport natural gas liquids from one corner of New Mexico to the other and ultimately to markets in South Texas.

The Bureau of Land Management's approval of the Western Expansion Pipeline III project comes just a week after President Barack Obama unveiled his plan for combating climate change, part of which included boosting the role of natural gas in energy production.

News of the pipeline's approval encouraged oil and gas developers in New Mexico, which is home to portions of both the Permian and San Juan basins.

Wow! The Market Closed Up 150 Points; Oil Up $2.39 to $103.63; North Dakota #1 In Beer Shipments/Capita

Happy Days Are Here Again
Awesome, huh?

This is also interesting, if not necessarily awesome. The Bismarck Tribune is reporting: 

A new study shows that North Dakota is tops in the nation in beer shipments per capita, if age is taken into account.

.... nearly 46 gallons of beer were shipped to North Dakota for every person of legal drinking age last year. Put another way, it's about 82 six-packs for every person.

New Hampshire was second at 44 gallons, followed by Montana with 41 and South Dakota with 39.

Stay thirsty my friends:

One (1) New Permit Issued -- The Williston Basin, North Dakota, USA; Africa Is The Hub Of Global Development -- Michelle

Active rigs: 188 (steady)

One (1) new permit:

• Operator: Oasis
• Field: Tyrone (Williams)
• Comment: 

Wells coming off the confidential list today were posted earlier.

The African trip: I don't know about "you," but I certainly don't feel I got much bang for the buck -- the $100 million price tag for President Obama's. Can anyone name three places he went, and what he actually accomplished for all that money? A hundred million dollars so that he could be out of town when he announced he was scrapping ObamaCare -- one piece at a time, staring with the "employer mandate."

Michelle: "We're in one of the most important continents on the planet," Mrs. Obama said. "It's at the hub of global development."

$100-million-trip to Africa. For what? $100 million. I can't even get my arms around that much money for a five-day trip or whatever it was.

One hundred million dollars, LOL

Another One Bites The Dust

The Oil Drum announces that as of July 31, 2013, the site will no longer publish new content. Its content will be archived.

The alternative name for The Oil Drum was "Peak Oil."

There really is some irony here. TOD recently gained a bit of notoriety when it suggested the Bakken boom was akin to the "Red Queen."

With the recent data coming out of North Dakota, on June 27, 2013, I asked the question, "Is the Red Queen dead?" Whether or not the "Red Queen" is dead, it looks like the interest in "peak oil" is dead.

Wisconsin's Fracking Sand -- National Geographic

Link.

I assume the link will break over time, but it's a nice article to skim through. Nothing new for regular readers of the blog.

Interestingly, the word "Bakken" was not mentioned in the article, except as a reference to an older National Geographic article. "North Dakota" was mentioned once, and only in passing.

Wow! Oil Is Up Over $103

Credit goes to the strong jobs report. LOL.

The article mentions that gold tumbled 3 percent but conveniently ignores what oil is doing.

Social Disobedience On A Grand Scale; "Opt Out" -- The Nice Way To Say "Shove It"

"Opt out."

With the president's decision to delay the employer-mandate statute of ObamaCare, I started blogging about "social disobedience on a grand scale." It will be interesting to see when mainstream media starts to use the same phrase.

The mainstream media is coming close. The AP reports that insurance companies are worried that young people will opt out. Insurance companies in California have already telegraphed what their internal numbers show. The two largest health insurance companies in California will get out of the the business of insuring individuals.

From the AP today, out of Miami:

Dan Lopez rarely gets sick and hasn't been to a doctor in 10 years, so buying health insurance feels like a waste of money.

Even after the federal health overhaul takes full effect next year, the 24-year-old said he will probably decide to pay the $100 penalty for those who skirt the law's requirement that all Americans purchase coverage.

"I don't feel I should pay for something I don't use," said the Milwaukee resident, who makes about $48,000 a year working two part-time jobs.

Because he makes too much to qualify for government subsidies, Lopez would pay a premium of about $3,000 a year if he chose to buy health insurance. 

Without the young, healthy, non-pregnant men and women not signing up for ObamaCare the program is dead. There will simply not be enough money to subsidize the millions of new folks signing up -- older folks with long list of medical ailments and pre-existing conditions. 

Dan Lopez will be fined $95 of 1% of his annual taxable income (whichever is more). Health insurance would easily cost $3,000/year. This is not rocket science.

And, oh by the way, if Dan does get sick, he can always sign up for ObamaCare later. 

Opt out. Shove it. Civil disobedience. It's all the same.

A New Monarchy

From IBD:

A president does not have the authority to unilaterally establish law as a monarch would. In our constitutional republic, laws are intended to be an agreement between the White House and Congress. One stands in the way of the other becoming a lone force of government without restraint.

Obama doesn't see it that way. Our government's chief executive, who has many times lamented that our system has made Congress an obstacle to presidents who desire to rule, would rather not be encumbered by constitutional protection of the people.

The monarch's action: war on coal. The enforcer: the EPA.
The monarch's action: delay ObamaCare's employer mandate. The enforcer: the IRS.
The monarch's action: warrantless wire-tapping. The "enforcer": NSA.

Shale Gas And Fracking In The UK

In light of Britain's horrific energy debacle, these stories take on added significance.

First, a new story: a British company is ready to frack the heck out of Lancashire, 250 miles northwest of London.

But the environmentalists will step in (an old story): UK has lots of shale gas but environmentalists won't roll over so easily.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. The UK does not have many options.

So Much For The CNBC Analysis; Oil Up $1.50; Market Up -- Fed Will Not Be Comforted By Jobs Report

CNBC called June's jobs report a "good report."

The market suggests otherwise. The "bubble" remains inflated due to the Fed's action, and will only deflate (slowly or otherwise) when the Fed changes course. The fact that the market is up solidly and oil is up another $1.50, suggests traders know the jobs report is much worse than what CNBC suggested.

When the only job growth is part-time jobs in the bartending and fast-food restaurant business, the "big money" knows this is not good. No matter what CNBC says.

Oil cannot possibly be up $1.50 because of events in Egypt. It's all about the jobs report and the weakening dollar, regardless of what the dollar does today.

So, some specifics for the archives:

• EOG hit a new 52-week high. 
• UNP is up nicely.
• KOG is up.
• OAS is really up nicely.
• BRK is up. 
• The major oil companies are all up.
• PSX -- a refiner -- is down. 
• AAPL continues to disappoint. 
• CHK is up, but SD down. 
• Confusing, CNP and SRE are down.
• MDU is up a bit.

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on what you read here or what you think you might have read here.

Friday Morning News & Views

Active rigs: 188 (down a bit)

Wells coming off confidential list have been posted. Not much to look at.

RBN Energy: US condensates to international markets. Conclusion to the 3-part series.

Was he or wasn't he? The State Department now says the SecState was yachting during the Egyptian revolution; he was on the boat for just a brief moment. Hillary: "what does it matter?"

CBS News had initially reported that one of its producers spotted Kerry boarding the boat at the Nantucket Boat Basin on Wednesday afternoon, within hours of the removal of Mohamed Morsi from power in Egypt. But the State Department denied that Kerry had been there.

WSJ Links

This is interesting (but I doubt I will read the article): "blending country hooks with rap phrasing -- plus some help from Wal-Mart -- an enterprising group of Southern artists have created a fast-growing new musical genre." -- I've always said country hooks were incredible (in fact, I think I blogged about that not too long ago) but I never would have used hip-hop and country in the same paragraph. So, we move on. But unfortunately nothing caught my eye in the Arena section.

However, on the way up to Starbucks I heard a reference to a new movie -- I missed it but googled the key words: "new movie Jolie Coen brothers" and found this: Jolie teams up with the Coen brothers. This came out last February, but I don't remember seeing it:
a film about Lou Zamperini, a former Olympian who was captured by the Japanese Navy while serving as an Air Force pilot in World War II. Jolie will direct
Now, back to Money & Investing.

This is not good news, overheard on the Street:

International Speedway Corp., owner of the Daytona International Speedway in Florida, plans to widen seats at its flagship racecourse by up to 3 inches. ISC aims to keep pace with race watchers' growing waistlines. "American food science has very successfully enlarged the size of the American consumer over 40 to 50 years," said ISC President John Saunders.

With the promise of 316 more food, beverage and merchandise points of sale, 40 new escalators and 10 more elevators at the new and improved speedway, Nascar fans' spare tires won't be in any danger.

As noted: this is not good news. The airline industry has to be watching with alarm: fewer seats; more weight. Not a good formula for airlines.

So, what's an airline to do? Increase fees.

Aside from the now-commonplace fees for baggage, changing reservations and better seats, fees will include items such as onboard Wi-Fi and speedier security screening.

Wow, talk about a slow news day. It looks like the news out of Egypt is already pretty ho-hum, but it did make the top story in the Front Section. No links, the story is everywhere. The most important bit of trivia: US law prohibits sending any money to any country run by a military dictator. This means Egypt does not qualify for the annual $1.8 billion the US sends the country. Of course, I assume the president can ignore this law also, just as he ignores his own ObamaCare law and delays implementation of the the "employer mandate."

Delay, delay, delay. Delay the employer mandate on his own law, his only "success" as president. Delay the permitting process in the Gulf of Mexico and the Arctic. Delay the decision on the Keystone. The only thing not getting delayed: the next Michellian vacation. But I digress.

It is only a matter of time before I join the crowd.

A growing number of Americans are getting permission to carry firearms in public—and under their clothes—a development that has sparked concern among some law-enforcement authorities.

Applications for "concealed-carry" permits are soaring in many states, some of which recently eased permit requirements. The numbers are driven in part by concern that renewed gun-control efforts soon could constrain access to weapons, along with heightened interest in self-defense in the wake of mass killings in Newtown, CT, and Aurora, CO.

One word of advice: before buying a handgun, stock up on ammunition. That appears to be the way the government will attempt to "manage" this phenomenon. Note:

Since July 1 of last year, Florida has granted more than 173,000 new concealed-carry permits, up 17% from the year before and twice as many as five years ago, for a total of about 1.09 million permits in the state.

Ohio, meanwhile, is on pace to nearly double last year's total of 65,000 new permits, which would be nearly three times as many as in 2007. And Oklahoma, Tennessee, Wyoming and Nebraska all have nearly matched or surpassed last year's totals with half of 2013 still to go.

Which state was not mentioned: Texas.  The first state mentioned? Ohio. A blue state. Who wudda thought?

From the article:

Craig Steckler, president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, said he could remember only "one instance in which someone effectively defended himself" with a firearm during his 21 years as police chief in Fremont, CA.

He's missing the point.

O'BamaCare seems to be unraveling, line-by-line:

The big expansion of health insurance envisioned under the 2010 Affordable Care Act is now looking less sweeping.

The latest indication that the coverage net won't be as wide as initially expected came this week when the Obama administration delayed for a year a requirement that larger employers offer health insurance to workers or pay a penalty. The move means businesses with 50 or more employees that don't currently offer coverage—such as some retailers and restaurants—can continue on that track without penalty until 2015.

While the unexpected move received attention, it is at least the third time that a development since the law's passage has potentially limited the expansion of insurance.
The two earlier snags involve Medicaid, a federal-state program for the poor, and the new health-insurance exchanges where individuals can buy coverage. The law was supposed to expand Medicaid to include more of the poorest Americans, but a Supreme Court ruling last year allowed states to opt out of that expansion; at least half are poised to do so.

At the same time, analysts warn that hiccups are possible in implementing the exchanges after more than 30 states refused to set up their own versions, forcing the federal government to operate them on states' behalf. 

The headline doesn't seem to to with the story, but a great story on Egypt: 

The moment served to underscore the Obama administration's limited ability to steer events in a Middle East still being swept by political upheaval. A reconstruction of how the U.S. handled Egypt in recent months suggests that U.S. officials saw the standoff building but were unable to persuade Mr. Morsi to pull back. Similarly, well-established military-to-military channels, through which the U.S. delivered quiet warnings against a coup, proved inconsequential.

Instead, the U.S. was largely a bystander while Egypt, once one of its closest allies, was again rocked by political turmoil. It initially was encouraged by prospects of working with Mr. Morsi, then grew disillusioned with him and ultimately did little to stop his ouster, lacking the leverage to shape events.

In the end, the U.S. may have ended up with the worst of both worlds. Regime opponents thought the U.S. backed Mr. Morsi for too long. Islamists believed Washington tacitly backed a coup.

And it's a big loss for Hamas. Wow, how things can change overnight. And, again, not one article on Syria.

Not much left. The Op-Ed section. There's a book review on Jessica Wapner's book on the "Philadelphia chromosome."  I saw the book at the Harvard Bookstore; paged through it. It did not interest me. For some reason, books on medical research don't interest me a whole lot much more.

The EPA may have lost a bit of interest in regulating fracking, but the agency is by no means dead.

Activists are pushing the Environmental Protection Agency to take a drastic regulatory step that could have significant repercussions for the U.S. economy. I'm not referring to the Keystone XL pipeline or taxing carbon emissions. At issue is the Pebble Mine—a natural-resource project in Alaska that could yield more copper than has ever been found in one place anywhere in the world.

In addition to an estimated 80 billion pounds of copper, the Pebble Mine also holds strategic metals like molybdenum and rhenium, which are essential to countless American manufacturing, high-tech and national-security applications. Yet even before a plan to mine the deposit has been introduced by the Pebble Partnership, the group poised to bring the mine into production, the EPA appears all too willing to bend to the pressure of environmental activists. The EPA has conducted a hypothetical environmental assessment of the region that positions the agency to pre-emptively veto the Pebble project before the partnership even applies for a single permit.

Apparently some left-wing environmental groups, like the Natural Resources Defense Council, Earthworks and Trout Unlimited are so worried that the project might make it through the permitting process that they're trying to stop it before it starts. As the NRDC put it in August 2012: "EPA's study (and intervention) is critically important. If left to its own devices, the state of Alaska has never said no to a large mine."

I guess like books on medical research, I've lost a bit of interest in the shenanigans of the EPA, as long as the agency leaves fracking alone. Smile. But it sure seems the EPA hates Alaska.

I guess this is enough for now.

So, what's the market doing in light of that great jobs report? Wow --

Random Note On June Job Numbers; The O'Bama Legacy; Longest Period Of 7.5%+ Unemployment; Part-Time Employment Is The New Norm

Updates

July 7, 2013: temporary jobs becoming a permanent fixture in the US, AP is reporting --

Hiring is exploding in the one corner of the U.S. economy where few want to be hired: Temporary work.

From Wal-Mart to General Motors to PepsiCo, companies are increasingly turning to temps and to a much larger universe of freelancers, contract workers and consultants. Combined, these workers number nearly 17 million people who have only tenuous ties to the companies that pay them — about 12 percent of everyone with a job.

Hiring is always healthy for an economy. Yet the rise in temp and contract work shows that many employers aren't willing to hire for the long run.

The number of temps has jumped more than 50 percent since the recession ended four years ago to nearly 2.7 million — the most on government records dating to 1990. In no other sector has hiring come close.

Driving the trend are lingering uncertainty about the economy and employers' desire for more flexibility in matching their payrolls to their revenue. Some employers have also sought to sidestep the new health care law's rule that they provide medical coverage for permanent workers. Last week, though, the Obama administration delayed that provision of the law for a year.

July 6, 2013: mainstream media is starting to point out what I've been saying for quite some time -- ObamaCare is going to result in a shift from full-time to part-time employment; and, where possible, a shifting of health care costs from the corporation to the individual; from the state to the federal government. The Wall Street Cheat Sheet:

Mulligan is the author of The Redistribution Recession: How Labor Market Distortions Contracted the Economy in which he argues that features varying from minimum wage laws to tax rates deepened, or very possibly caused the recession by distorting incentives and causing massive job loss.

Similarly, he argues in his piece for Economix that Obamacare will make employees and employers alike opt for part-time hiring, a feature which could profoundly change the way American industry operates.

While he points out that a “lack of health benefits and the lower pay for part-time work have traditionally discouraged people from taking part-time jobs rather than full-time jobs,” now, he says, “Because part-time workers will be eligible for the subsidies except in the rare instances in which their employer covers them, full-time work will no longer carry the advantage of access to health insurance. That by itself will encourage more people to seek part-time work.”

Essentially, the law could have the unintended consequence of manipulating a marketplace predicated on having full-time workers to reach maximum productivity to switch largely to part-time employment, since the incentives will now be greater. In line with the argument advocated in his book, this is going to discourage firms from hiring full-time at a massive cost to the taxpayer.

Whereas he shows that a full-time position with health insurance costs an employer $56,000 a year, and leaves the employee with about $34,000 in pretax salary, now, thanks to a subsidy offered in President Obama’s healthcare law, part-time workers will be able to earn essentially the same wage ($33,908), and have the $12,658 dollar difference paid for by the United States Treasury. This will create a phenomenon, he argues, that will incentivize fewer work hours since the cost to the employer is the same, and taxpayers will be stuck to make up the difference.

Original Post

The O'Bama legacy: record stretch of 7.5%+ unemployment -- 54 months. 

The O'Bama legacy: only 47% of "American" adults have full-time jobs.

Part-time jobs surge to new all-time high.

College course catalogs are being re-edited as we speak.  New offerings include:

• Analytical Hotel Housekeeping
• Comparative Burger Flipping
• Deconstructing Lattes 201
• The Tao of the Walmart Greeter
• "How Can I Help You?": Cashier Dialectics in the Postmodern Age

CNBC is reporting that the growth in part-time jobs accounted for the entire job growth in June, while full-time hiring actually decreased. The largest sector of growth: bartenders and fast-food restaurants.

This was predictable.

The question is whether this is a one-month anomaly, or whether this is the beginning of tectonic change in the way America hires workers.

There were two important data points.

The first important data point: the added jobs were all part-time. ObamaCare mandates part-time jobs if companies are to survive. Each new permanent worker will cost companies $5,000/year in health car premiums (or more) vs $2,000/employee penalty.

The second important data point: the sector that will be most affected by ObamaCare is the fast-food industry.

It certainly appears the fast-food industry is adjusting quickly to the new reality.

Is That All There Is?

CNBC is reporting a good jobs report:

• unemployment does not budge: remains at 7.6%
• job growth below the magic number of 200,000
• the entire "increase" in jobs was due to part-time hiring
• full-time hiring actually decreased
• area of greatest growth: bartenders and fast-food restaurants

Analysis:

• "we're adding just enough jobs to keep with population growth; in other words we're trading water"
• the number of people employed part-time for economic reasons (in other words, not because they want to) increased by 322,000 to 8.2 million in June; this is a material increase and one that is concerning

I assume Joe Biden wrote the CNBC headline.

***********************************

Wells Coming Off The Confidential List Friday

• 20493, 1,099, WPX, North John Elk 28HC, Reunion Bay, spacing: 320 acres; t4/13; cum 24K 5/13; 10 stages; 1.9 million lbs sand frack; the lateral was drilled in one continuous run; originally this was a Zenergy permit for 1280-acre spacing; somewhere along the line it was changed
• 24173, drl, Statoil, Panzer 22-23 4H, Alger, no data,
• 24544, 341, Mountain Divide, Olson 35-26-1H, wildcat, t4/13; cum --

Comment: note the spacing on the WPX well -- 320 acres. There are a number of 320-acre spacing units in the reservation.

Another Solar Company Calling It Quits In Europe

Reuters is reporting:

Japan's Panasonic Corp plans to shut down its sole European solar cell plant next March and dismiss about 500 workers at the factory, the Nikkei reported. 

The Hungarian factory will end production in September, leaving the company with one solar cell plant each in Japan's Osaka and Shiga prefectures and another in Malaysia, the business newspaper said. Equipment from the Hungarian facility will be transported to the other plants, the daily said. 

The European solar energy market is dominated by Chinese suppliers such as Yingli Green Energy. The market has been shrinking due to duties imposed by the European Union on imports of Chinese solar panels.